1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the remote sensing art, and more specifically to apparatus for remote utility meter reading, including responses at the premises to fires, gas leaks, and other hazards, by sending alarms to utility companies, the fire department, and other emergency responders, and also emergency adjustment of electricity and gas connections.
2. Background Information
An important task of utility companies that provide households and businesses with electrical power, gas, water and the like is the reading of the meters that have been installed at those locations in order to apply appropriate monthly charges for having provided the service. That effort can be expensive and time consuming, if it is necessary for company employees to travel to each place that receives such service and read the meters that have been installed to measure the utility usage. Such work is also dangerous and expensive, with meter readers having had traffic accidents, and the like, or having to pay for insurance policies that would compensate for such events. Difficulty even in reading those meters can also arise, perhaps because a home owner keeps a dog in the yard, or shrubbery has been allowed to grow up over the meter, or the like. In fact, in some cases it has become the practice of utility companies to prohibit installation of meters behind a fence, which may require the use of extended lines running from the home or other building, which can be particularly expensive in the case of gas lines. For these reasons, much effort has been made to accomplish such meter reading remotely, preferably automatically, so that a minimum of costly human intervention would be involved. Filed with this application is an Information Disclosure Statement that sets out a number of issued patents in which it was sought to carry out remote meter reading. The present invention will be seen neither to have been anticipated nor suggested by any of that prior work, whether taken separately or in combination.
At the same time, it could be important to obtain other information by such remote means that is not presently collected, particularly as to any malfunctions or errors in the use and operation of the utility equipment, or indeed emergency situations in which a particular house or business may have caught fire, or a gas leak has developed. Warning of the existence of a fire or gas leak is of course important in its own right, but it is also important to know what the condition may be of the utility (electricity or gas) equipment. Even more importantly, when no one happens to be in the home or at the office, it would be extremely useful if protection were provided against some emergency situations automatically. In factories or the like, water sprinkler systems that will turn on when a fire breaks out will often have been installed, but such equipment may be deemed not appropriate to the home, and typically no other such protection is provided. Even so, the present invention includes the capability of automatic activation of strategically placed fire extinguishers. With respect to electrical power, since insulation burns and electrical shorts can create even more fire, the continued presence of live electrical power in the context of a fire can be dangerous, both as to adding more fire and, perhaps by inadvertent contact with the house wiring, to the firefighters that will be arriving to get the fire under control. Similarly, the heat of a fire may break a gas line, and the release of such gas would undoubtedly increase the fire substantially, and even more dangerously may bring about an explosion.
What is needed and would be very important for safety reasons, therefore, is a means by which the operation of the electrical and gas services would be shut off as soon after the outbreak of a fire as possible, or as soon as a gas leak was detected, and the firefighters should be made aware of that condition before they arrive at the site so as not to enter into any attempt, perhaps dangerously, to turn off either the electricity or gas, which would not be necessary if that had already been done. Turning off those services would often help to minimize the effects of the fire, or prevent a gas explosion, and the work of the firefighters could then be carried out more safely. Under situations such as a barricaded felon, or hostage circumstances and the like, it would also be useful for police departments to have remote means of controlling the furnishing of utilities. The present invention thus provides a method and apparatus by which either or both the electrical and gas services would be shut off automatically at the outbreak of a fire or occurrence of a gas leak, while at the same time providing remote notice both of the existence of the fire or gas leak and of the status of the electric and gas utility. Such an early warning would permit an earlier intervention in the fire or gas leak, so as to bring the particular circumstance under control and indeed to put out the fire or repair the gas leak, and the initial and dangerous step of turning off the electric power and gas in the midst of actual fire fighting would be avoided. It would also be appropriate for the respective utility companies to provide, to the owner of the home or other building, instructions that announce the presence of this shutoff capability, actions with respect to such facilities that such owner either should take or would not be allowed to take, and the circumstances under which the equipment would be used, as part of the service contract.